Chapter II: Part 2

"Sure it's important!" exclaimed the big, Polish cook with the felt hat. "Vot you t'ink ve goink around for a valk only for our healt'?"

"Shut up, Sceranka!" said Weston, reeling in the line. "You see, we don't like the set-up. There's too many government boys who think naturally they got the say-so around here. They still recognize Captain Merman as the head man. And it seems they sort of got things set up their own way." The other five men, if they were not watching Valerie, were watching Uncle Andy for his reactions as Weston spoke.

The fishline came in empty. Weston baited again.

"I can see your point," said Uncle Andy. "You favor a more democratic method of setting up the colony, now that the emergency is over and we are peacefully established on land. The rules governing international flights do not apply here. Since there is no government, or any contact with one, the people must elect one. Is that what you're getting at?"

Weston looked at him in surprise. "Yeah! That's the idea!" he exclaimed. "The democratic system!"

But Uncle Andy and Henry did not like the grins on the other men's faces.

"Now take me, for instance!" Weston continued, casting out his line again. "I'm up for election!"

This time, Valerie had to turn and stare at him in astonishment. He looked down at her as he reeled in the line and gave her a smile that revealed gold-capped teeth.

"What's the matter, beautiful? Wouldn't I make a good candidate? I got a platform already. No red tape. No promises. And no taxes. Just do as I say and we'll all get along."

"Obviously," said Uncle Andy, "that's a brand of politics that belongs to gangsters. What can you possibly hope to gain even if you are the Boss of this outfit?"

* * * * *

The hook came in empty, so Weston threw the pole down on the rock. He faced Uncle Andy and gave him that twany-eyed, brooding look of his. "I got this to gain," he said. "None of us knows what's gonna happen. Maybe our chances of gettin' back to civilization are slim. But if things get tough I ain't going to be breakin' my back under nobody else's whip. I don't go for this gold braid and paper baloney. I think half the camp is made up of a helpless mess of blubber as far as _men_ go. Of course, as far as the women go we don't mind them bein' helpless! We'll take care of them, but first they gotta come down off their pedestals and get some sense into 'em!" He and all his men looked at Valerie. "We might never get back home," he said, pointedly, "and in that case things have got to be a lot different around here. And me and my boys have just got the guts to make the necessary changes!"

Uncle Andy stiffened, but he held his temper. "Tommy," he said, "what is it you want? How does this visit of yours apply to the meeting tonight?"

"We're going to force the issue on voting in a new leader. I'll be a candidate. If you know what's good for you, you'll vote for _me_!"

Uncle Andy wanted to ask him why they should vote at all as long as Weston had decided how the voting was going to go, but instead he said, "How about giving us time to consider it? Until tonight."

"Sure! Just so you decide by tonight. You can't vote before then!"

"Yeah but what about the dame?" Whitey blurted out. "You know what you said."

Instinctively, Valerie sprang to her feet and drew close to Uncle Andy. Just as instinctively, he put an arm around her, protectively.

Tommy Weston hooked his thumbs into his pants and drew close to Uncle Andy. "Now there's another point I'd like to bring up," he said. "Just who elected you the fair haired boy with blondie, here? You may have to get used to some different ideas before long."

"So it might as well be now!" put in Whitey, coming shoulder to shoulder with Weston.

The other four men closed in also. The big Pole with the hat was sweating more profusely now, and his eyes grew large as he stared at Valerie.

"So we've come to this," said Uncle Andy, actually stalling for time.

"Let's face it!" exclaimed Weston. "We always _been_ here!"

"Yes," Henry broke in. "You're right! There was a thin, fake covering called civilization, once. But now at the end of time the covering comes off and we find nothing has changed since the Stone Age!"

Tommy Weston sneered. "So the young genius has to put his two-bits in, too! Well, boys, the conference is over!" He reached out for Valerie's shirt, just as Pee Bee suddenly got to his feet in a crouching position, ready to uncoil.

Uncle Andy's fists were coming up when another man shouldered his way between the construction men. Action froze on all sides as they looked at the newcomer. He stood there in shirt, trousers and tan sport shoes. It was Scarface, wearing a very handy looking shoulder holster. From the holster, the butt of a black automatic protruded.

"Any trouble up here?" he queried, nonchalantly, as though he were asking if the fish were biting.

* * * * *

Tommy Weston's already tanned face darkened, as did Whitey's. The other men backed away, slightly. In addition to having a respect for the gun, they respected the man. None of them knew who Scarface was, actually, but they remembered he had had the nerve to shoot it out with the alien.

"So the little gun boy is going to take sides!" sneered Weston.

Scarface raised his brows and spoke unsmilingly through his teeth. "I've got news for you," he said. "As a trouble maker you're an amateur. I'm professional, but please don't ask for a demonstration today. Now I want all you hairy-chested little girls to climb back on your kiddy cars and toddle home, because there's no more Mickey Mouse today."

"If you didn't have that goddam gun I'd swedge your sassy yap shut!" threatened Weston, looming over him and fuming.

Scarface's eyes flashed. "I said get the hell out of here!"

Weston brought himself under control and tried another tack. "What's in this for you, Scarface?" he asked. "You don't strike me as the Sunday School type. You know what the score is around here. So why don't you put in with us or sit out?"

"Your business and what you do is none of _my_ business," said Scarface, "as long as you leave my friends alone. These are my friends, so lay off!"

"Look out!" screamed Valerie, and Uncle Andy jerked Scarface out of the way just in time to avoid Whitey's lunge.

Whitey lunged again, for the gun, and as Scarface turned toward him, Weston threw an arm around his neck that looked like the root of an oak tree. Scarface kicked out at Whitey, making him lose his balance, and Pee Bee bowed his back as Whitey went over him. When Pee Bee straightened up, two things happened. His head collided solidly with the big Pole's chin, knocking him out, and Whitey sailed beautifully into the crashing waves below. His terrified yell was drowned by foaming seawater. Simultaneously, Uncle Andy snatched the gun from Scarface just as the latter broke loose by scraping his heels down Weston's shins, almost breaking his arches, and at the same time nearly pulling the other's ears off.

Weston broke free of the ear grip while Uncle Andy held the other men at bay. As Scarface turned on Weston, the latter swung at him ponderously. Scarface ducked and gave him a swift jab into the stomach. As Weston doubled, he received a two-fisted uppercut, and as he toppled he was aided on his way by a double blow across the left temple. He came down like a brick chimney and lay there in a heap.

Pee Bee stood there rubbing his head and looking down at the prostrate figure of the Polish cook.

"Get Whitey!" cried one of the construction men, pointing at the ocean. "He'll drown!"

While Uncle Andy still held them at bay, they all looked at the man in the water. Whitey was screaming and flailing wildly about, while the undertow and the incoming waves alternately dragged him outward and dashed him against the rocks.

"What's the matter?" asked Scarface, rubbing his knuckles. "Can't he swim?"

"He can swim," said the same man, "but something's got him!"

As they watched, the water darkened around Whitey.

"It's blood!" cried Valerie. "Oh my God, the poor man!"

"Look!" cried Henry. "Those are devil lizards! Hundreds of them!"

* * * * *

Like a voracious swarm of piranhas, the scarlet little monsters converged on Whitey and tore him apart. As the blood filled the water, other "things" were attracted. There were glimpses of finned, serpentine backs and vast, amorphous shadows beneath the churning waves. To those who watched, the eternal light above them seemed deceptive. Subjectively, they were aware of the dark Unknown. The very dark _Unknown_.

_Where were they?_

One of the construction men ran away screaming. Pee Bee, carrying the lunch basket, took Henry's arm and also started to lead the way, gently but firmly. Uncle Andy handed the gun back to Scarface. He led Valerie down the rock, wordlessly. And Scarface stood there looking back at the bloodied water for a full minute.

Then he followed the others. Weston and Sceranka, he decided, would have to come by themselves and find their own way back to camp.

The fishing pole lay there, abandoned....

The camp was similar, in effect to a military beachhead prior to organization. There was one tent, salvaged from the survival gear that the plane carried. This was used by the women for the purpose of changing their clothes, as well as a sort of "safety deposit vault" for valuable articles such as the ship's log, medicinal supplies and various instruments--plus short wave sending and receiving gear, now quite useless owing to a lack of power source and an absence of activity on the wave bands.

Beyond the tent lay confusion. Small huts constructed of branches and giant leaves, or square areas enclosed by sheets or towels, suspended on crude frameworks rigged together with poles. Here and there a more presentable structure of branches indicated the work of construction men. Between these were scattered both small and large heaps of luggage and personal belongings--suitcases, pullmans, hatboxes, overnight bags, small trunks, packing cases--even an aluminum cage in which reposed a bewildered Pekingese dog. A very lonely dog. The only dog in the universe.

Inevitably, there were clotheslines displaying underwear, shirts, socks, silk stockings, bras--and a man's pair of black silk monogrammed pajamas. These latter belonged to the Englishman, Sir Cyril Rollins. And there was a hammock strung between two straight-boled trees without leaves which bore a weird fruit that looked like pomegranates. The hammock was shared by the three soldiers from Texas. Just now the hammock was empty except for a ukelele and a million year old copy of Life Magazine.

Farther up the endless beach was the plane, lying crumpled on its belly, with wings drooping dejectedly into the sand and water. One of the landing gears had burst up through a nacelle. The great, swift, mechanical bird of another age was a useless thing--and a painful reminder of what once was their own familiar world.

Altogether there were in camp sixty males and twenty-four females, representing three races and eight nationalities. A cross section of the human race. Seemingly, all there was left of it.

* * * * *

When Henry returned with the others to camp, Martia was the first to greet him. She had suddenly lost the last vestige of her patrician affectations, because she ran to him abruptly. Or rather, their thoughts seemed to meet between them even before they drew together. He squeezed her hand warmly as she drew him to one side, excitedly.

"Mother is lost!" she exclaimed. Her eyes were slightly reddened from crying.

"Lost! How do you know?"

"She and Sir Rollins and that Mr. Langham and the Crispin sisters and those two mothers who lost their babies went exploring for spring water. They've been gone all day and nobody can find them! Henry, I'm so worried! Can you speak to your Uncle and ask him to organize a real search party. There's no night here. We can start right away!"

"But the meeting--"

"Please!" she insisted.

"What I mean is, no search party can be organized during the big meeting, and that's about ready to get under way--after everybody eats supper." They could see the fires along the beach where men and women were cooking. Either they were cooking small game caught in traps or certain species of edible crustacea, or a potato-like fruit that was abundant in this region. The food from the plane was long gone. "Why doesn't your governess do something about it? What does she think?"

"Emily? She made a few soldier boys go with her to search--those three Texas boys--and I think three of those WAACs went along. But they've disappeared, too!"

"All right," said Henry. "Let's go see Uncle Andy."

They found him, with Valerie Roagland and the air hostess, Peggy Hollenbeck, engaged in a group discussion that included Captain Merman, several high-ranking U.S. Army officers and the five congressmen led by Burley. Also, there were a few businessmen and scientists present, including Dr. Edwards. Most of them stood around a charcoal fire boiling small chunks of meat on long wires and drinking "Beachcomber's Tea," made from the leaves of a giant vine that someone had discovered. A chemist and a doctor had collaborated on its analysis and found it to be healthful.

"We still represent the United States," Congressman Burley was saying, "and Colonel Rogers here says that the servicemen are on our side. Also, we can count on the English to be with us, if necessary, and the three Norwegians. I don't think Weston has a chance of making trouble. Now here is a list compiled today showing the number of men--"

* * * * *

Congressman Burley stopped talking and followed the gaze of all the others. He saw Henry and Martia standing by the fireside, holding hands and looking very impatient.

"All right!" he said. "You kids will have to clear out. We're having a conference."

"That," said Henry, "is somewhat obvious. But I--"

"Now look here! Don't you get sassy!" Burley glared at Henry impatiently, but Uncle Andy walked over to the boy and put an arm around his shoulders. He placed his other arm around Martia.

"Just a minute!" he interrupted. "I'm afraid you don't know Henry. He would never have intruded if he did not have something important to say."

"Always pampering the kid," commented Dr. Edwards to Captain Merman. "Thinks he's a genius and he's only a pest!"

"Your English allies have gotten themselves lost," said Henry. "Lady Dewitt, Sir Rollins, the Crispin sisters, Langham, Emily Duncan, several other women and three servicemen."

"Please!" Martia cried. "It's always daylight here. Can't a search party be sent right away?"

Some of the men looked at Captain Merman. He was a tall, lean man in his late thirties, still wearing the pants and shirts of his uniform, as well as the cap. His paleness and the redness of his eyelids, thought Henry, were probably due to a hyperthyroid condition.

"My orders," said Merman, "were that no explorations would be conducted without proper authorization. They went on their own, principally because of Lady Dewitt's refusal to use the river water and because our distilled water can't be rationed in her favor. I don't see why--"

"You are engaged here in an emergency conference," said Henry, "to determine what can be done about Tommy Weston's gang. If you're worried, why don't you stall for time by organizing the whole camp into a search party--including Weston's men? The physical action and the adventure of it will be tantamount to a psychological weapon against anarchy."

Martia beamed at Henry in pride and gratitude, but most of the men guffawed.

"Ye gods!" exclaimed one of the other congressmen. "That sounded like it was going to be a filibuster! Talk about lobbying! This kid is Capitol material!"

"But it isn't getting us anywhere," said Burley.

"Just a minute," said a small, dark-complexioned man wearing a black shirt, white slacks and dark glasses. "I've heard, second-handedly, some interesting ideas from this boy." Henry had learned that this was Dr. Jules Bauml, a noted astro-physicist attached to the Mount Palomar Observatory. "He thinks we have been transported through time and that it is futile to try contacting our own civilization unless we avail ourselves of a time machine. Of course that is a pessimistic view, but owing to observations of my own I should like to hear his reasons for arriving at such a conclusion."

"Oh hell!" ejaculated one of the businessmen present. "We're probably down in the Caribbean somewhere!"

"No, by God!" said another one. "That wouldn't explain the permanent daylight and no sun!"

"A freak of Nature," insisted the first one. "You've heard of the Land of the Midnight Sun. What's so different about this?"

"Everything!" said Henry.

They all looked at him, startled, including Uncle Andy.

* * * * *

Henry addressed Dr. Bauml. "As an astronomer you will understand the nature and importance of the ionosphere," he said, amidst raised eyebrows all around. "It is that layer of the atmosphere which protects us from the dangerous short radiations from the sun. These quanta, striking atoms of oxygen, create ionized oxygen and ozone, forming the ionosphere. Such atoms are necessarily in such rapid motion that they would be lost in space were it not for the magnitude of Earth's gravitation. That is why Earth bears--or _bore_--a high form of intelligent life whereas Mars must continue to lose its ionized oxygen into space and could therefore not support a high form of life."

"Yes, yes!" exclaimed Bauml, impressed. "But what has that to do with the present?"

"Venus does not have an ionosphere," continued Henry. "Otherwise it would have shown up in spectrographs. Its atmosphere is caused largely by violent volcanic action. Volcanoes, incredibly heated storms and no ionosphere, spells no oxygen and no life. Therefore, conclusion number one: We are still on Earth."

Several congressmen snorted. "Who said we weren't?"

"Go on!" encouraged Bauml, while Dr. Edwards began to listen in some surprise. "I agree so far! This is Earth, but where do we go from here?"

"Let us disregard, for the moment," said Henry, "that there is no night. Just concentrate on the fact that we can't see the sun at _any_ time, clouds or no clouds. Ergo, the ionosphere has changed its composition. It would take millions of years to do that, just as it took billions of years to build it up in the first place. I submit that the sun has cooled and the ionosphere is much thicker than it was before, thus acquiring different characteristics of refraction which reflect light back to Earth. It is almost like a mirror. Just as it once reflected radio waves back, it now shuts out the shorter wavelengths, including light, itself. I submit further, that if the sun were still bright we should notice a difference in relative brightness between day and night. Inasmuch as there is no difference, I say that the sun is now grown dim and feeble, and that we have traveled perhaps a billion years into the future."

"Hey!" cried out another civilian. "I thought there were only five psychos in camp! One billion years! What the--"

"Yes," put in Dr. Edwards, with an impatient scowl, "this business of extrapolating is next to nothing, as it leads nowhere. By the boy's own argument I could give the rebuttal that if a billion years have passed then Venus may have had time to finally develop an ionosphere and thus be able to support the higher forms of life. Behold! I submit that we are on Venus!" This was followed by sympathetic laughter all around.

"Wait now," insisted Dr. Bauml. "Give the boy a chance! Henry, you _have_ let me down into mere hypothesis, but we might as well have all of it. Let me ask you a question. If the sun has cooled, why are we surrounded by all this evidence of lush, tropical life? We should be freezing!"

Henry replied immediately. "Either the ionosphere has developed a sustained reaction that provides us with heat and the regular, life sustaining quanta, while absorbing the hard radiations, or--" He paused, groping suddenly for words.

"Or what!" demanded Dr. Edwards.

"Or _someone_ has set up nuclear heating plants all over the planet, or their equivalents. Wait!" He held up his hand as Dr. Edwards joined half the others in derisive laughter. "Go back to that alien creature who stole the babies. Just before he disappeared, precipitating us into our present environment, he spoke to us in a gutteral language that was vaguely familiar. You were present, Doctor Bauml, when he spoke. I understand you recognized that language. What was it?"

* * * * *

Dr. Edwards sobered. He and Merman and Burley and the others stared at the diminutive astronomer. The latter looked embarrassed.

"I--am German, as you know," he said. "As such I was naturally familiar with Middle High German, owing to my educational background. That is what this alien spoke. I only caught a few words, which were to the effect that no harm would come to any of us if we did something or other."

"Why didn't you tell us this before?" queried Merman. "If that freak spoke German--"

"Wait!" interrupted Henry. "Middle High German is a dead language. It came into use in the dark ages before the Renaissance and it died out with Martin Luther in the Sixteenth Century of our own era. The fact that this alien spoke that language indicates that he is a time traveler. He has been in our era before and I'll tell you where, when and why!"

"_That_ is a tall order," put in Dr. Edwards.

Uncle Andy turned to Valerie Roagland and the air hostess. "This is the tallest extrapolating I've ever heard from Henry."

By this time, many other people were gathering around to listen, including servicemen and a number of Tommy Weston's men.

"All right!" said Merman. "Let's have it! Where, when and why?"

"The place?" said Henry. "Westphalia, Germany. The time? Twelve eighty-four A.D. The reason? To kidnap children. Oh, I forgot to mention the town...."

"Hamelin!" exclaimed Dr. Bauml, astounded. "You mean--"

"Yes," said Henry. "The Pied Piper of Hamelin--no legend. An actual fact!"

"What is this?" asked one of Weston's construction stiffs. "A booby hatch? Let's get on with the meeting. Weston'll be here any minute!"

"Wait!" said Henry again. "Analyze it for yourselves. What does _pied_ mean?"

"Mottled color," someone offered.

"Exactly!" Henry exclaimed. "But it was no clown suit worn in a fairytale. Our alien's skin was definitely mottled. And he was a piper, too!"

"What do you mean?" asked Dr. Edwards.

"I heard it, Martia heard it, and the two children who were kidnapped heard it. I believe only younger ears can hear it owing to a greater sensitivity of the hair cells in the spiral cochlea. The sound, of course, has nothing to do with flutes. It was a phenomenon produced by his equipment."

"Hold on, screwball!" said another one of Weston's gang. "I know all about that Pied Piper yarn. What about the rats in Hamelin? How did he get rid of those?"

"Legends," said Henry, "are twisted from the truth because people who inherit such stories must always reduce the Unknown to the level of their own understanding, just as the people of our own time insisted that the flying saucers were everything from beer bottle tops to weather balloons. People in following generations could not accept the original story, so it degenerated gradually into a nice little bedtime story. But the fact remains, this Pied Piper is a time traveler who needs children for some purpose of his own. He represents a very advanced science. It is possible that he is here, somewhere, and _if_ he is, we might have a chance of getting him to send us all back to where we came from!"

Suddenly, the Indian Prince broke into their midst. His turban was slightly awry, his eyes were large with anxiety, and he was sweating. "Please!" he exclaimed, in a thick accent, wringing his fat hands in supplication before Henry. "You are an older soul! You have a vision beyond us all! I believe only you can save us! If you can bring me back to my own world I will pay you anything! I am rich! My fortune is yours if you will do it!"

This led to general confusion, but it also led to something else. One of Weston's men separated himself from the crowd and went to find his leader. Weston and Sceranka were back in camp, eating supper and licking their wounds. But they were gratified by one salient fact. Scarface was conspicuous by his absence. There would be no interference from him tonight....

* * * * *

When the meeting took place, Weston and Sceranka came to it alone. The rest of the gang, numbering about thirteen, were nowhere in sight. Merman and Burley told him about the missing people and suggested a postponement.

"To hell with that!" he told them. His mouth, though bruised by Scarface's fists, grinned at them in a way that was not at all reassuring, and his tawny eyes met theirs with a new confidence born of secret knowledge. "We can send a search party later. Right now we're concerned with--"

"In other words," Burley broke in, unsmilingly, "you insist on having the meeting?" About fifteen officers and servicemen silently closed in around the periphery of the group, but this did not appear to bother Weston, although Sceranka kept looking at them nervously.

"Yes," Weston answered. "Let's have the meeting!"

"Then you are out of order!" snapped Burley. "We will follow those rules of order which are befitting to a deliberative assembly. Captain Merman is our Chairman. We have an agenda for discussion, which will be introduced in proper sequence. Anyone wishing to speak will first recognize the Chair."

"Oh can it!" fumed Weston. "That's why I'm here--to tell you we're going to cut all the red tape and get down to facts--"

At a sign from Merman, two M.P.s stepped forward and tapped Weston on the shoulder. Each carried a club. They smiled through their teeth.

"We are the Sergeants at Arms," said the largest of the two, who was at least within twenty pounds of Weston's brawny mass. "Do you want to be nice or be made to stand in a corner?"

Weston appeared to swell like a toad. When his eyes met Sceranka's, over the M.P.'s shoulder, he nodded almost imperceptibly. Whereupon Sceranka threw his hat into the air.

Within three seconds, six G.I.s on the outside of the circle yelled in pain and fell to the ground. Protruding from their backs were crude but sturdy arrows. Standing on the beach sand just outside the jungle were twelve bowmen, all from Weston's gang. Two were Spaniards. One was a Filipino law student who had flunked out of Oxford. One was a pale, continental type, a non-descript foreigner traveling on a French passport whom Merman had suspected of being a Communist spy. The rest were American construction stiffs--not the ordinary kind who signed up on a year's contract to save up and come home again, but the camp drifters who had roamed the world since adolescence, men actually without a country, uneducated, but capable of running heavy equipment for American tax dollars. It was strictly a "cost-plus" crew, thought Burley.

Women screamed. Men cursed. And there were cries of "Murderers!" "Assassins!"

Weston and Sceranka ran to a position in front of their men, who handed them the only two axes in camp.

"All right!" Weston shouted. "I thought this party would turn out this way. From now on, _I'll_ run this show! You're going to shut your traps and listen to _me_!"

* * * * *

The remaining officers and servicemen, plus many of the older male civilian members of the camp, were gathering swiftly into a sullen crowd, facing Weston's bowmen.

"When we charge 'em," whispered one officer, "throw sand in their eyes and let 'em have it!"

"Just a minute," said Uncle Andy to all the members of his own group. "All this happened because we failed to recognize the man's ignorance. Let him talk! Talk is cheaper than human lives. Let's hear what he has to say!"

"Well, Dearden," shouted Weston, "You're getting smart!--even if you are insulting. But I'll take care of you later!"

"All right!" agreed Burley. "Let him jabber!"

"Spill it, Weston!" shouted Merman. "We've got plenty of time around here. All our lives!"

"No we ain't!" Weston answered. "We ain't got no time at all. We think there's a way of gettin' back to where we came from! Hey, Mohammed!" he yelled at the Indian Prince. "You willing to come on my side and pay off like you said if I get you back home?"

The Indian Prince, though frightened, separated himself from the crowd. He stood there, hesitantly, looking first at Weston, then back at Henry. "I will go with anyone," he said, "even assassins, if they lead me home! And I will pay! But young Henry here--he's the one who--"

"Sure!" grinned Weston. "Henry's the boy with the answers! You didn't think we were going to leave _him_ out, did you? He's going to help us find that big, bad bogeyman who stole the babies. And then when we find him we're going to sort of talk him into sending us back--that is, those who are on my side!"

"What's the matter with you, Weston!" shouted Burley. "We all have the same goal. If you had taken time to listen--"

"Pipe down! We been listening to you government guys all our lives and never got nowhere. We don't want this party to turn into another Korean truce talk. We want action!"

* * * * *

In that moment, Weston saw action, but of a totally unimagined kind.

Very suddenly, the world about them changed. Geologically, it was the same. The same, eternal daylight sky was above them. Before them lay the same, mysterious ocean with its plethora of unknown life forms. The low hills, the jungles, the flowers, the colorful birds--almost all the same.

* * * * *

But the jungle had been cleared away for several miles, and in its place stood a modern city with tall, well-designed buildings, electric power facilities, and motorized traffic. On the sea lay a fleet of gray battleships and cruisers. In the sky were at least a hundred jet aircraft, of strangely futuristic design, black and delta-shaped. The latter were attacking the warships with bombs and rocket fire, and their ears were assailed by the staccato reports of guns answering from the ships--and from the land.

The city defenses were aimed also at the strange, black aircraft. Ack-ack was all over the sky. Bombs and planes screamed through the air, and the ground shook with the shock of explosions.

The castaways, including Weston's gang, stood on a great pier before the sprawling city--a pier which lay half demolished around them, smouldering from several recent hits. Nearby, out in the water, lay a commuter vessel, semi-capsized, its crew and uniformed personnel leaping overboard and attempting to swim back to shore.

Armed troops were all around the castaways, rushing to set up new defenses on the pier, to repair loading derricks and put out fires with portable equipment.

"Hey!" shouted one of the castaways. "It's just like back home!"

"Civilization!" shouted another. "That screwy Garden of Eden was all a bad dream! We're back--thank God!"

Henry reasoned it was not the scene of battle they were welcoming. It was rather the transition from an unknown situation to a comprehensible one that they hailed with such relief.

"What is it?" queried Martia, close beside him. "What's happening? Where are we?"

"We're _not_ back home," he said. "Still in the future--but an alternate one. Keep your eyes open and we'll know very soon."

This was a pointed remark, inasmuch as an officered detail of troops had turned its amazed attention on the heterogeneous group. Weston's gang, especially, looked like a bunch of anachronisms with their crude bows and arrows and their stupidly gaping mouths.

"Look!" cried Doctor Bauml, pointing over the heads of the approaching soldiers. "On that distant hill!"

When everybody looked, they saw, unmistakably, a towering space ship, its slender nose pointing skyward. Men swarmed over it like ants, removing scaffolding. Some of the attacking planes were concentrating on this point and were being met with the most determined counter-fire observable in any part of the city.

"That rocket ship," said Uncle Andy, "seems to be the main issue of the battle."

"Andy!" exclaimed Valerie Roagland. "Are all of us insane?"

"I say there!" cried the officer in charge of the detail surrounding them. His accent was unmistakably British. "Who are you and whence came you?"

"That would be a better question if _we_ asked it," replied Burley. "What the devil _is_ this!" He waved his hand in an all-inclusive gesture.

The officer's eyes narrowed. "Why do you evade the question?" he almost growled. "You are certainly not of New Bretania. Therefore, you are Texanian spies! You are under arrest!"

"Good Lord!" exclaimed Henry, turning pale. "Oh no!"

"What, Henry? What is it?" insisted Martia. Uncle Andy, Valerie, Miss Hollenbeck and Pee Bee crowded close, listening to the two and watching their captors at the same time.

* * * * *

Burley drew himself up and addressed the officer. "I am an official representative of the government of the United States of America," he said. "I demand--"

"My dear sir," flamed the officer. "You are not in a position to make demands. You will follow me promptly and obey orders under penalty of death! Can you not understand that we are under martial law here?"

"Git on wi' ye!" said one soldier nearby, prodding Weston and Sceranka with a double-barreled, automatic rifle. "Or ye'll git a puck in the lug!"

"Let's go, everybody," said Colonel Rogers. "Inasmuch as this is a military situation I'll take charge of our group and be the spokesman. When we're presented to the authorities for questioning we'll have time enough to tell our story."

"And who would believe it?" asked Dr. Edwards, pessimistically.

"Who would believe _this_!" retorted Colonel Rogers.

They all marched along with their captors, including Weston and company, simply because there was no alternative.

In a subterranean staff headquarters somewhere in the center of the city, they faced an impatient Major in the service of Her Majesty, Helena III, Empress of New Bretania.

"What is all this!" he complained, over an unprocessed pile of urgent communiques, even as two visiphones on his desk glowed red call signals simultaneously. "Who are you? I can't be bothered at a time like this--"

"We don't wish to bother you," interrupted Colonel Rogers. He could appreciate the indescribable urgency of war and knew it would be best not to antagonize the officer with too much verbage. "Our presence here is not of our choosing and it would take too long to explain, although we are perfectly wiling to do so at your convenience. Suffice it to say, we are neither New Bretanians nor Texanians. So I suggest you place us in protective custody for the time being, and if you need volunteers for some of the manual work in the city you may call upon us to help."

The Major ignored the visiphones and glared at Colonel Rogers. "I said--who are you?"

"I am Colonel Rogers, attached to the Infantry of the United States Army, and these are--"

"United States!" exclaimed the Major. "That's a myth! What in the devil are you trying to say?"

Henry shook his head sadly, but with a grim expression of conviction on his aquiline face.

Martia's eyes were wide as she drew closer to him. "Henry!" she whispered. "I think I _know_!" Tears came to her eyes, and she said, "Mother! I'll never see her again."

For answer, Henry pressed her hand, wordlessly, and continued looking at the Major.

"Please!" said Dr. Bauml, pressing forward. "What is this battle all about? What is that space ship for?"

* * * * *

The Major sprang to his feet, motioning to the guard detail that had brought them in. "These strangers are some type of Fifth Column!" he exclaimed. "They are obviously attempting to camouflage their true identities and their purpose under a blanket of innocence! But no one could be _that_ innocent of the facts!" He leaned forward, addressing Dr. Bauml. "My dear sir, in case you have been reposing under a rock somewhere, I'll bring you up to date! Earth is dying! The ionosphere is shifting toward critical mass. Our race--the human race--is becoming sterile under the hardening radiations. It is imperative that we transport some of our kind to another world--Venus, to be specific! Or hadn't you heard that Hardesty and Williams discovered an atmosphere there under the upper dust strata? The Texanians could not build an ark such as ours--so they want it!" His dark eyes blazed angrily. "_You_ want it! You are Texanians and you want our ship, but you're not going to get it! Take them away! They are spies!"

"Irons, sir?" asked the officer in charge of the detail.

"Irons be damned! Execute them! This is war!"

They stood in a bleak prison yard, sixty-nine passengers of MATS flight 702, London to New York. But where they were just now did not matter. A ganged battery of machine guns faced them, with one operator seated apathetically at a bank of controls.

"_Ready--!_" cried the officer in charge.

Some of the women screamed, while others prayed. Uncle Andy had an arm around Valerie Roagland, as well as Henry and Martia. Sceranka was swearing in Polish. Pee Bee was hiding behind as many people as he could find, shivering.

"_Aim--!_"

Henry thought: This is all impossible! I can't let it happen! But who am I to--

Something began to happen inside his head. It felt like he had had a cold and his ears were clearing up. But it was purely a mental sensation. Suddenly, he saw everything with a new clarity. And in the same instant he began to utilize that new faculty.

But before the word, "Fire!" could be given, a new change occurred with the abruptness of an explosion....

* * * * *

They were back again at the old campsite on that timeless shore, with the jungle all around them. The city was gone, as were the warships and the planes and the soldiers--and the space ship. There stood Weston and Sceranka as before, in front of their calloused bowmen.

And Weston was saying, "We want action!"

Both Henry and Martia looked at their companions in growing amazement, _because the others acted exactly as if there had been no interlude whatsoever_! Yet Henry and Martia, when they looked into each other's eyes, knew that _they_ remembered!

"Wait!" cried Henry. Everyone looked at him, including Weston and his gang. "Something has happened! Doesn't anybody remember?"

"Remember _what_!" exclaimed Weston, impatiently.

"The city! All those warships and planes!"

They all looked at him, blankly, and he and Martia returned their stares, anxiously.

"The Major who called us Texanian spies! The space ship! The firing squad--I mean, those machine guns!"

Again, the blank, uncomprehending looks.

"The kid's cracking up!" said Weston. "Let's get on with this! Now I'm running things and I'll tell you what we're going to do!"

Just then Martia and Henry grasped each other's hands, their eyes wide with consternation.

"Henry, do you--"

"Yes!" he hissed, cautioning her to silence. "I hear it!"

_The ringing was in their heads._

"Henry," said Uncle Andy, "what in the world were you saying about a city?--and about this--er--space ship?"

Henry grasped his uncle's arm and signalled to Valerie, and Peggy Hollenbeck. "Follow me quickly!" he said.

The two young women looked at Uncle Andy and he studied Henry and Martia gravely. Then he turned to them and nodded. They all followed. Henry and Martia both put their fingers to their lips, admonishing them to silence.

They were about fifty feet away from the group when Weston yelled at them. "Hey! Where you think you're going?"

Henry grabbed Martia's arm and told her to scream and flail about, which she did instantly.

"The girl's out of her head!" answered Uncle Andy, catching on. "Psycho! We'll be back in a minute!"

"Well--hurry it up!"

When they gained a clump of verdure that cut off their view of the others, Henry motioned them into the woods. They all ran in to hide, only to be overtaken by Pee Bee.

"What done happened to dat girl?" he asked, panting.

"Nothing," said Henry.

"Then why are we here?" asked Peggy, the air hostess.

Henry looked at them squarely. "It's that alien," he said. "He is close by."

"The alien!" exclaimed Valerie. "How do you know?"

Pee Bee went bug-eyed again. "You mean dat Missing Link is back? Man, where's mah feet!"

"Stay here!" said Henry. "I believe he is searching for the main group. We can go back through the jungle and watch from hiding."

"Oh no!" exclaimed Pee Bee. "Dis am de point of no return! Ah just lost mah reversin' equipment and can only head straight for the no'th pole!"

But they all went back and looked.

* * * * *

Just as they arrived at their hidden point of observation, a bedlam of sound smote their ears. Screams, yells, swearing--the sound of running feet.

"Wait a minute!" they heard Weston shouting. "Hold on, all of you! I'll handle this!"

The sound of running stopped. The bedlam subsided.

They saw Weston making gestures at his bowmen to take up a new position. With tense motions and sober faces, the men obeyed, fixing arrows to their bowstrings while the rest of the camp watched them--and something else that stood just on the edge of the jungle.

There, towering a head above the tallest man, was the alien, staring at all of them with his one, baleful eye. Across his chest, near the breathing orifice in the middle, he wore several patches of something that looked like plasters, or bandages, where Scarface had shot him. He looked weak. His shoulders slumped, and his arms dragged almost to the ground.

"What's the matter, Merman?" yelled Weston.

Merman had been one of the first to run. Now he stood at a considerable distance from the group, looking back.

"You were willing to have a small bunch of guys tackle this freak in the lounge on board the plane," Weston shouted. "But now when you're face to face with him you run! Don't go yellow, Merman! I said I was taking charge, and I _am_!"

Weston looked at the crowd of castaways and grinned, contemptuously. "This was our 'common goal,' wasn't it? Now I've got it my way! If it was up to you guys, you'd all put on your best ties and sit down to have a conference. Not me! I say--_get_ him!"

Whereupon, he led his men toward the alien, axe in hand.

"No, wait!" cried Dr. Bauml. "Don't harm him or we'll never know!"

When the alien saw Weston and his gang approach, he did nothing. He only stood there and watched them come. He still wore the same pack of apparatus on his back and the controls at his waist. The tendrils around his double wrists flicked nervously. And many there were who wondered what had become of Scarface--the man with the gun.

Weston stopped in front of the alien, about five feet from him, which was approximately just beyond the other's reach.

"Now talk, damn you!" he said. "You got us into this and you're going to get us out of it!"

But the alien gave no answer. Nor did his single, multi-faceted eye move from its fixed focus upon the man who addressed him. It glared in its concentration, indefinably.

Weston turned to his men. "He's dead beat," he said. "Those bullet wounds made him weak. We gotta capture him, but don't mess him up too much. We'll just get him down and tie him up. Somebody get some rope!"

Confidently, Weston dropped his axe temporarily and hitched up his trousers. As he did so, his arms and chest bulged and glistened massively in the eternal light of the sky. Sceranka hulked ponderously behind him, his ham-like paws ready for action. Five more of Weston's best huskies closed the semi-circle before the alien.

* * * * *

Henry could feel the pulse in his arteries, and he saw a pink spider making a web in front of him, in the timeless, geometrical design that all such spiders made. Beside him, he could feel Martia's tenseness. Down by the beach, the waves rolled peacefully across the sands, sighing with the eternal voice of the sea. The jungle smelled of damp rot and sickly sweet flowers. And he sweated.

Weston, grinning somewhat tensely now, slowly lifted up his axe again, with the blunt end toward the alien. He took one swift step forward, but that was all. The alien emitted a blood-curdling, monstrous roar and waded into the gang, just as Weston reversed his axe and struck him a blow in the neck. It was an interrupted blow, because the alien's great arms flew up and sent Weston sailing unconscious through the air. He then grabbed Sceranka, oblivious to three arrows in his side and four men climbing onto him, striking, punching and tearing at him. Sceranka's rib case popped audibly as he was instantly crushed and mangled. Then the alien turned and tore one man's arm off and sent another of his attackers flying after Weston, headless. The others turned and ran.

But they did not get far.

He paralyzed them with some invisible force controlling it from his waist. Others did not need this treatment, because they had fainted.

Then he released them from the paralysis sufficiently for them to walk, but not to run. He motioned to all of them, making it quite plain that they were his prisoners and were to follow him into the jungle.

Without a murmur, they obeyed like somnambulists. The alien leaned over the ones who had fainted and did something else with the controls at his waist. These also revived, in a state of trance, and obeyed his silent commands. In single file they went--Merman, Nelson, the navigator, the commissary steward, Congressman Burley, Dr. Bauml, Dr. Edwards, Dr. Singer, Colonel Rogers, the women, the servicemen--all of them blindly following a trail into the Unknown.

Henry and Martia turned to look at their companions. There were Uncle Andy and Valerie and Peggy. But Pee Bee had gone. His trail of sudden departure was marked cleanly through the otherwise impenetrable underbrush on their right. Sizeable branches looked as though they had been shorn clean.

Silently, these five watched their friends and enemies depart--all of those who had not been killed--and excepting Weston, who seemed also to be dead. He lay face down in the sand, arms pointing toward the jungle, feet awash in the surf. He had been thrown thirty feet.

Henry felt Martia shudder.

* * * * *

It was decided that to trek aimlessly through the jungle unaware of what they were looking for would be futile. Instead, they chose to follow the well delineated trail of the captives in order to determine where the alien was taking them.

Uncle Andy and Henry provided the two women with bows and arrows which had fallen from the hands of some of the alien's attackers.

"Do you know how to use them?" he asked.

"Yes," said Valerie Roagland, "but I hope it will not be necessary." The arrow heads were tipped with sharpened pieces of aluminum rod taken from the plane. In fact, some of the arrows were made entirely of aluminum rod.

"We don't know what may be in that jungle," said Uncle Andy, picking up Weston's axe for himself. He carefully examined the blade of the axe. There were traces of very dark blood on it. "Our Pied Piper was wounded in the neck by Weston's blow. I wonder if he'll survive. After all, bullet wounds, arrow wounds--and a chomp in the neck with an axe!"

"Good Heavens!" exclaimed Peggy Hollenbeck. "That ought to spell curtains even for Superman!"

"But--" Martia started to express herself, then her eyes widened in alarm as the full implication of her thought struck her. "He is the only one who knows what this is all about!" she exclaimed. "He's the conductor, the engineer and the crew! He knows how we got here and how to get us back to where we came from--if that is possible. If he dies now--!"

They all looked at each other in shocked silence, except for Henry. He merely experimented with one of the bows.

"She's right," he said. "Whether friend or enemy, we've got to make sure that creature does not die until we learn what we need to know. But I'll tell you one thing that may be encouraging...."

Peggy Hollenbeck's chin began to tremble and her eyes misted suddenly. "Henry, if you can say _anything_ encouraging about this whole business, for the love of God let's have it before I crack up!" Valerie put her arms around her and the other burst into a fit of crying, which was a delayed reaction from what she had witnessed fifteen minutes before.

Martia might have joined her, but the secret knowledge she shared with Henry helped to sustain her.

"Somewhere in that jungle," said Henry, "is a time machine...."

He calculated that the shock of that statement would bring Peggy out of her semi-hysteria, and it did. She looked at him over Valerie's shoulder, her tearful eyes suddenly wide with surprise and wonderment. Valerie and Uncle Andy both turned slowly to stare incredulously at the two adolescents, both of whom appeared to share the same conviction.

And Uncle Andy thought: _What incredible thing is it these two children share in common?_

But he asked, "What makes you think so?"

* * * * *

It was then that both Henry and Martia launched themselves into a detailed and vivid account of that strange interlude in time which they, alone, remembered. The other three listened, with both mixed emotions and mixed opinions relative to the youngsters' sanity.

"The reason we're giving you such a wealth of details," Henry concluded, "is because therein lies the proof that there is a time machine in the jungle."

Uncle Andy shook his head, bewildered. "I'm afraid I'm hopelessly lost," he said. "I can't see where it fits in. And if it happened, why wouldn't the rest of us remember it? You say we were there, too."

Henry cast a covert glance at Martia, and only she could understand what that look meant. Impulsively, she grasped his hand and held on to it.

"Let's skip your lack of memory for a minute," Henry answered. "Instead, try to remember the fact that certain people were missing in this camp before the meeting took place."

"That's right!" said Valerie. "The English people--" She looked at Martia. "Your mother, Lady Dewitt! She went away and got lost!"

"And Sir Rollins!" put in Peggy.

"Now it comes back," said Uncle Andy. "They had gone out to look for springwater and had not returned."

"To make a long story short," said Henry, "there were two separate groups. First, the English group, consisting of Lady Dewitt, Cyril Rollins, the Crispin sisters, the two mothers who lost their babies, and Mr. Langham. The second group consisted of Mania's governess, Emily, three WAACs, and the three Texas GIs.

"Now as I see it, here's what happened. The first group found the time machine and entered it, possibly without knowing what they were doing. They were transported back in time perhaps several thousands of years. Stranded there and with no other recourse but to survive, they set up their own type of colony, and their descendants established the Empire of New Bretania."

Peggy looked at Valerie, and both found a common conviction in their eyes. They were sadly understanding and patient as they looked back at Henry and Martia. Uncle Andy only refilled his pipe with the last of his tobacco and watched Henry intently.

"Now wait a minute!" put in Martia. "Henry's not as crazy as you think! Let him continue!"

"We're listening," replied Uncle Andy.